Eight-Nine-Ten: The Countdown Begins

MGMAT CAT 1 done today. Score 640 (80%) Q43 (70%) V 36 (77%). It was good to see myself crossing 600 for the first time. But there were too many wrong ones in Q. I got 18 wrong out of 37 & still got 43. So not a good news again for me. On verbal, I got 15 wrong.

After the CAT, went to gmat club test m06 & screwed that up. Got 18 correct, but the real count was 22 as four correct answers were not shown due to connectivity. Anyhow, I am doing a CAT daily now & after that I am finishing my Club Tests. I dont know why, but I love taking the gmat club tests. They are great.

Guys!! any adivce, how can I take my Q to 48 & verbal to 40??

Till today, the details of tests taken are shown below.

06/28/10--------GMAT Prep-------------------590---Q-44--V-27
07/12/10--------800 Score--------------------600---Q-36--V-36
07/13/10--------MGMAT#1--------------------640---Q-43--V-35

07/07/10--------Club Test m01---------------26 (70%)---(47% percentile)
07/08/10--------Club Test m02---------------28 (78%)---(48% percentile)
07/09/10--------Club Test m03---------------27 (73%)---(61% percentile)
07/10/10--------Club Test m04---------------25 (71%)---(35% percentile)
07/12/10--------Club Test m05---------------27 (73%)---(67% percentile)
07/13/10--------Club Test m06---------------22 (59%)---(xx% percentile)

07/08/10--------Club Test v01----------------25 (61%)---(36% percentile)
07/09/10--------Club Test v02----------------19 (46%)---(5% percentile)

Let me be a bit philosophical. If you can see deep down in your soul/heart/etc and see why you miss questions, what would be your 2 reasons?

hear/soul/etc , dont know what comes under "etc".

Thanks bb for th query. I am reaching a stage, where I now know where am I weak. In Q section, 3-4 questions I do wrong due to my silly mistakes. & the other 3-4 are about probab & combin. I am not good at prob & didn't try too much on it, thinking that hardly 1 or 2 questions will appear in real test but during my practice here in club tests & other CATs I see 3-4 prob questions & get them wrong often. In verbal, I have no idea. First it was RC, now its CR & SC which is bringing my score down. When I do the old problems from OG, my correct % is high, but not on CATs.

Hmmm! good to know that your verbal improving. Just focus on your weak points and try to eliminate them as much as you can. But it doesn't mean that you should not care about your strong areas, do care about your strong areas (that way you can avoid silly mistakes).
When doing CAT, try to relax and don't think about what would happen and how much can I do, just focus on what is in front of you at that time. Well, I've meditated some time back and believe me meditation helped me a lot to gather myself & my life (it was messy some time back), you are on leave & staying at a peaceful place, I would say take half an our out of your life for meditation (good for concentration) on daily basis and then see what good does it bring. And, before sitting for CAT take 10-20 deep breathes and it would reduce stress level as well as help you to concentrate.
I think SC is your strong area, and in SC you should not get too many wrong answers. And, as far as RC is concerned adopt to the passage (use technique which is best for the passage at hand, Rhyme's & Gin's techniques are useful). At this stage you have to become sharp and I hope you would.

If you would've been here in Islamabad, I could help you with Prob & Comb, but I would suggest revise Prob & Comb chapters from MGMAT Word Translations.

Best of Luck & try to relax and focus.

I am back after having a day off. Yesterday, I went for the second 800 score CAT. Result, 570 Q 37 V33. I was totally out. Started my gmat club's mo7, but could not complete it due to sadness. I started to think that is 09-Aug is a good time to sit in the exam as I think I will waste an oppurtunity simply. 15 days ago I took my first GMAT Prep & my score was 590, so I thought its time to give another shot after 15 days. During these 15 days I have given 2 CATs from 800score, 1 CAT of MGMAT & 8 club tests, 6 Q & 2 verbal.

So today I delted the "test 1" file from the GMAT Prep program files & took the first practice test again. As expected, didn't see any repeat. During the exam, I went through some disturbance as my nephew asked me for mobile & I was fuious. My concentration was lost, but still I completed both parts & pressed the final "next" button to see the score. I was expecting a 600, but the score was............., you can see in the attached figure, 710 Q47, V40. I was shocked but not happy at all, reason being I know it was due to luck!!. I got 15 wrong in Q & got 47, last time I got 13 wrong & scored 44. Secondly, in verbal I got 10 wrong but managed 40 (again amazing). Then the missing factor was found. In verbal I got the first 15 correct which helped boosted my score.

Now, I am in a state of mind, where I am neither happy nor sad. I wish I had this luck on test day . If you have a look at my score table below, you will see a great variation. So its decision time now. I have to decide should I sit on Eight-Nine-Ten??

06/28/10--------GMAT Prep-------------------590---Q-44--V-27
07/12/10--------800 Score--------------------600---Q-36--V-36
07/13/10--------MGMAT#1--------------------640---Q-43--V-35
07/14/10--------800 Score--------------------570---Q-37--V-33
07/15/10--------GMAT Prep-------------------710---Q-47--V-40

07/07/10--------Club Test m01---------------26 (70%)---(47% percentile)
07/08/10--------Club Test m02---------------28 (78%)---(48% percentile)
07/09/10--------Club Test m03---------------27 (73%)---(61% percentile)
07/10/10--------Club Test m04---------------25 (71%)---(35% percentile)
07/12/10--------Club Test m05---------------27 (73%)---(67% percentile)
07/13/10--------Club Test m06---------------22 (59%)---(xx% percentile)

07/08/10--------Club Test v01----------------25 (61%)---(36% percentile)
07/09/10--------Club Test v02----------------19 (46%)---(5% percentile)

Awesome improvement Hussain... Hats off dude... u made a massive improvement from V27 to V40..

Plz help me as i m facing similar problem as yours and really struck at 600...
seniors-plz-help-really-fighting-with-verbal-and-timing-97269.html

Thanks..

wow - great score but quite a bit of a jump? Did you see a lot of repeats on the GMAT prep?

I didn't see any repeat. Actually after my first attemp, I didn't go through my mistakes or even the questions, just to make sure that I dont remember any thing. BUT, I still believe it was just my luck as my quant wrong count increased from 13 to 15. I luckily got the first 15 verbal questions correct & it changed the whole picture. It was my lucky day othewise no big improvement from my side.

@sag:

1. I sometimes feel that timing play a crucial role even if you get a number of questions wrong. I mean if in verbal you are left with 4 minutes & you have 8 questions to go, you will do random guessing. Some how, GMAT knows that you have guessed the last few questions (perhaps by the rapid clicks you make on the answer choices, it makes your time per question to abnomal level like 40 sec each for the last 4 or 5). This makes GMAT to dedcuct a significant socre as it proves that you are not a good time manager. Same happened to me last time around. This time I went with my table, with no fear of getting some questions wrong & so I had 8 minutes for my last 4 questions & I completed the verbal with calm. (I am attaching the table for your reference).

2. Second point is the old one. First 10-15 questions play a major role. I wish I can get the first 12 questions correct in real test, I can reach 700.

Thats great improvement. i do agree with you that Gmat penalizes the test takers who do random guessing.

Your timing/question number excel seems to be quite difficult to remember....Dont you think it wastes a lot of time if we check after every 10-20 minutes?

Thanks Hussain once again... ll try to focus on these issues..

what .. we get penalized for random guessing? even if we guess right? is it only on the last questions or anywhere?

I was planning on guessing on the last rc passage on gmat.

So I am back after a one day gap. During the last two days, I have learned two things.
1. Continuous study is not benefecial specially in GMAT. I was with my machine for the last two weeks, taking different CATs & club tests. Yesterday I felt my brain is no more working. It was exhausted. So I kept aside all the plan & took a break. During the day time I went through some OG verbal questions but not so many. Today again, no major work. So these two days were my break time.

2. My brother has been asking me to go for a walk or to jog in the evening. I never did this during my study through out my academic career but today I did. It was a good experience. I liked my brother quote that " How can you cut a wood continuosly with the blade, unless you take some time to sharp it & you will feel that after sharpening the blade works more effectively".

So break & some excercise is good during the study.

I did one more thing which I think I should not have done. I logged in Knewton to see what it has for me if my socre is not a good one. Will Knewton help in increasing my score by 50 points. Anyhow, this has enabled me to take the free Knewtong test tomorrow . Lets see how near Knewton is to the real score.

Will update you tomorrow on my Knewton experience.

Its not the fact just my opinion that GMAC must be penalizing random guessing eg...u have 1 min left and you did last 7 question in 1 minute. Since it reduces your percentile by 3 if you leave question unmarked. So I thought it must be penalizing those who try to finish their test by random guessing.

So do not take it as hard and fast rule, guess wherever you are not sure of the question and MOVE ON.

Now I know what GMAT is all about. The stress, through which I am going these days, is something new for me after 5 years of my graduation. One thing is very clear now; nothing will be awarded easily. 700 mark is easy for a great chap but not for me & I will have to earn it. So my GMAT saga continues, atleast for next 15 days

Now guess what happened yesterday when I took the Knewton diagnostic test. I got 530, Q 36, V27. Only 5 questions I got wrong in Q but still a 36. No wonder, I wrote Knewton & still waiting for their reply.

Today was my second MGMAT CAT. Score there was 660, (Q47 V33). Seems some improvement is coming as the first score at MGMAt was 640. My CAT practice will be finished during next week and after that it will be just revision of all concepts & books too. The updated test details are shown below

06/28/10--------GMAT Prep-------------------590---Q-44--V-27
07/12/10--------800 Score--------------------600---Q-36--V-36
07/13/10--------MGMAT#1--------------------640---Q-43--V-35--(80% percentile)
07/14/10--------800 Score--------------------570---Q-37--V-33
07/15/10--------GMAT Prep-------------------710---Q-47--V-40
07/18/10--------Knewton 1-------------------530---Q-36--V-27--(46% percentile)
07/19/10--------MGMAT# 2-------------------660---Q-47--V-33--(86% percentile)

07/07/10--------Club Test m01---------------26 (70%)---(47% percentile)
07/08/10--------Club Test m02---------------28 (78%)---(48% percentile)
07/09/10--------Club Test m03---------------27 (73%)---(61% percentile)
07/10/10--------Club Test m04---------------25 (71%)---(35% percentile)
07/12/10--------Club Test m05---------------27 (73%)---(67% percentile)
07/13/10--------Club Test m06---------------22 (59%)---(xx% percentile)

07/08/10--------Club Test v01----------------25 (61%)---(36% percentile)
07/09/10--------Club Test v02----------------19 (46%)---(5% percentile)

Keep fighting

Just keep on fighting and practicing, InshaAllah you'll cross the 700 mark. At this time I think you are at 670-690 mark. So more & more practice will guarantee you the 700+ along with control on your nerves. It's all about what do you do at the time of the test, so adopt yourself to that environment & pressure before hand and then you are good to go along with practice, practice, and practice.

Good Luck